Chapter 16
SADIE
Iwas in the arena, in the ashes, only this time blood spilled and stained the ground. Grey to dark crimson. Spreading, pooling.
“We call wolves monsters,” Suri said in a voice like a guttered flame. “But the real monster is you, Sadie Blackhouse. You murdered me in cold blood, and you don’t even feel remorse.”
“I do,” I cried, my voice strangled and thick. “I didn’t mean to kill you.”
Suri scoffed and lifted her head, and I saw her throat was cut across the front, a knife wound where the break had been in her neck. It wept so much blood that the entire arena turned dark with it, and then the blood began to seep into me.
I stumbled back, a small noise escaping when I held my hands up and found them both slick with blood. Suri’s blood.
“I’m sorry,” I gasped, and when the last drop of life drained from her and soaked into the ash, she dropped to the arena floor, and I woke up.
I should have known. That was the first thought that flitted through my mind when consciousness tugged my eyes open. They were gritty and sore, but with sleep, not the ashes Suri had thrown in my face. No, Rogue healed my eyes. Was that where I was—still in the medic room?
Reality slapped me around the face when I tried to move, and my entire body erupted with white-hot, screaming agony. Rev and her henchwomen. The ambush. The fall. Or rather, the push over the deadly fall.
I should have known better than to think something good would happen to me.
I’d just accepted that Lunova Academy might not be the worst thing in the world, that having friends might be the singular good thing to come from Gran selling me to the academy.
But I didn’t get good things. I never had before; why start now?
Starlight? someone said, with the ring of a name. Can you hear my voice?
God, another voice groaned. Equally male and unfamiliar. You named her Starlight? You couldn’t pick a normal name?
Why would I give someone so mesmerisingly beautiful a normal name? I can’t just call her Ann; look at her.
Enough, a third voice commanded. Quiet, soft, but so dominant that I whimpered. The kind of voice that never shouted because it never had to; the kind of voice where people listened to what he spoke. You’re overwhelming her.
Were they talking about me? I frowned, blinking when my vision refused to resolve into more than a smear of green and brown. And fuck, it hurt to move. I tried to stand up and failed.
Yeah, killer, the sharp voice snapped. We’re talking about you.
I ignored him, trying to stand. It was as if I was a toddler learning to walk all over again; my body didn’t behave the way I expected, and I pitched over the moment I managed to stand.
Easy. That was the calm, dominant voice. Your body is still recovering, so be patient with it.
I’ll be patient when I’m fucking standing, I snapped. I refused to stay on the ground with three unfamiliar men around me. I didn’t even need an imagination to think of all the ways they could hurt me.
We would never, one of them breathed, sounding horrified. The first one who spoke. We’d rather rip out our own hearts than cause you one second of pain.
Speak for yourself, the sharp one muttered.
I managed to get my legs under me, to push off the ground, but I was far from steady. I’d forgotten how to work my legs, but at least a few blinks brought my eyes into focus.
Trees surrounded me, tall enough to tell me they’d been here centuries, the canopy above my head shutting out most of the moonlight. The scent of them overpowered everything else for a moment, so crisp and clear that I swore I’d never smelled trees like these before.
Other scents broke through, though. Black coffee, the kind found in a coffee shop where they made a big deal about the origin of the beans, where the rich, comforting scent of the coffee filled every square inch of space.
Then the scent of a wood fire, so clear I could picture it dancing in a fireplace, hear the sound of it crackling; a weight dropped from my shoulders as I pulled it into my lungs.
Warmth so essential that I didn’t know how I’d survived in the cold without it.
And then the inexplicable scent of marshmallows, so sweet the taste filled my mouth until I salivated, hungry.
I turned—slowly—to glare at the three men who’d found an unconscious woman and decided it was cool to harass her, but I went deadly still when I found three pale wolves watching me from only a few feet away.
Pure instinct held me in place, and I didn’t dare to breathe. They hovered, watching with eyes so vivid, they sent my heart into a broken beat. Chocolate brown. Forest green. Ice blue.
I stared into those eyes and—my fear settled. What the fuck? I tried to back away, but my feet were glued to the ground. My body refused to move, and not just because I’d forgotten how to work the damn thing.
If I didn’t run, these wolves were going to attack me and drag me back to their den so their pack could feast on my flesh, pass chunks of me among all the pack members and—
Wait. No. Oh, no. I was so afraid that my mind had defaulted to its pre-Lunova setting. These weren’t ordinary wolves. Lunova trained slayers to kill werewolves.
These three wolves staring at me like a hunk of meat were shifters.
You’re not a hunk of meat, that breathless, awed voice blurted. You’re an angel, fallen from the skies.
Fallen from that hill over there, the sharp one quipped and—
I can hear you, I blurted, and yet… I couldn’t hear my voice. Not in sound. And yet…
Breathe, alianaza, the calm one said, and it hit me so fast that I scrambled backwards, trying to throw up my hands to ward them off.
The wolves. I could hear the wolves in my head.